


Do You Know Your Team

by whatteam_voltron



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Insecure Lance (Voltron), Lance (Voltron) Angst, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-04
Updated: 2018-03-08
Packaged: 2019-03-27 00:13:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13868961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whatteam_voltron/pseuds/whatteam_voltron
Summary: To gain the support of another planet, Voltron must go through a test to determine how much they know each other, for if they don't trust each other enough to be honest, how can another planet trust them to be honest with their promises?Unfortunately, this makes Lance realize that he probably shouldn't have kept so much from the team. Because if they don't get enough points to earn the alliance, the person with the lowest score must die.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place in the future-ish. For context Shiro is the real Shiro and they all are back to the original lion setup with Allura as a backup for if someone is injured and of course as always she is the negotiator when dealing with other planets.
> 
> I posted this on Tumblr (whatteam-voltron) so that is me. I just cross post for maximum attention.

“To have our alliance, you must pass a test.”

“What? I didn’t even get to study!” Lance complained.

“This is custom. For us to trust you we must be sure you trust each other, know each other.” The alien seemed to stare at him, though he had no eyes that Lance could see.

“What the blue paladin meant to say was we will welcome any challenges you have for us. We understand your support is not given to just anyone, and we will be glad to prove ourselves.” Allura did her best to pivot from Lance’s slip-up.

“Very well. You all must proceed into the next room. There will be a chair for each of you.”

Allura nodded and led the paladins through the door into a dimly lit room. Sure enough, there were 6 chairs, though they were distant from each other. 

“This is kind of… spooky.” Hunk said. There were a few hums of agreement.

“Allura briefed us all on how important this alliance is.” Shiro reminded them. “I’m sure we can handle whatever they have for us.” He was the first to sit. The others followed suit. No sooner had Pidge filled the final seat than they were blinded by lights.

Clamps came out of the chair and secured each person to the seat by their waist and arms.

“Hey!” Lance yelled.

Keith grunted. “What the hell is this?”

“Welcome, newcomers, to our test. Here’s how it works. Soon your chair will descend into an individual room below you. Here there will be some questions. For each you must give your answer, and you must decide what each other team member was likely to choose. You must answer honestly. At the end, your answers are revealed one by one. Predicted answers that end up correct gain points. If your team accumulates 50 points, we will consider your alliance. If not, the one with the lowest score will die.”

“What?” Pidge yelled.

“We agreed to a test, not to risk a paladin’s life!” Allura’s eyes were filled with fury.

“If they don’t know you that well, we will only be strengthening your team by weeding them out. Besides, we can’t trust you if you aren’t willing to take risks for us. The test has already begun, there is no room to argue.”

Then the floor fell out from under them.

Lance landed in a room with what looked like a tablet computer. It read “Question 1: Who is the weak link on your team? Please drag each answer to the box for the proper teammate.” The choices were Allura, Pidge, Hunk, Shiro, Lance, Keith, and No One. Lance gave a halfhearted laugh and his right arm was released. It was time to get this over with.

…

“Welcome back, I see you all finished your answers. Now, we-”

“Yeah, yeah, we’ve all seen game shows. Speed it along.” Lance said, a little annoyed at this point.

“Very well then Question 1: Who is the weak link on your team? You could have picked any individual or none at all. Let’s see what you predicted Princess Allura would choose!”

A television came on for them to see, and there was a box for each paladin. Shiro, Pidge, and Hunk predicted No One. Lance and Keith each predicted themselves.

“Aaaaannnnd her real answer is… No One! Three points for the team!”

“Next, let’s see what you thought Shiro decided.”

There were three answers of “No One,” but both Keith and Lance responded with Lance.

“Lance, you okay? Did you just see your name and pick it without looking at the question?” Pidge tried to joke, but their eyebrows still contained worry.

Lance gave a halfhearted chuckle. “Huh. Yeah.”

Shiro’s answer was revealed to once again be “No One.”

“You’re up to six points now.”

Lance was next, and he squirmed uncomfortably in his seat. Keith and Shiro both responded with “Keith” and the others kept the trend of trusting that no one thought there was a particular teammate holding everyone back.

His answer was revealed to be himself. He grimaced as he felt eyes on him.

“Buddy,” Hunk started.

“Don’t.” Lance said.

Keith was next. Lance and Pidge both predicted he said Lance, and the rest chose no one, which was his answer.

“Really?” Lance asked. “You’re kidding me, even you- you think I’m terrible at missions!”

“You’re annoying sometimes and you get distracted, but you have gotten us out of situations we couldn’t have overcome alone.” Perhaps Keith was being a little cheesy, but they were all worried about Lance by now.

Pidge followed. Everyone predicted No One from them, except Lance, whose answer stayed the same. Pidge’s real answer was also no one.

“Oh, come on!” Lance yelled, frustrated.

“Are you mad I think you belong on the team as much as the rest of us?”

Finally, it was Hunk’s turn. When the predicted answers came up, he looked hurt as he turned to Lance. “Buddy, even with me?”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just so you know all 4 parts are already on my tumblr I just didn't want them to all go up at once on here because, well, if I'm being honest I wanted the maximum amount of attention, so. Sorry.

Naturally, Hunk picked No One as his answer, which almost everyone knew.

Lance held his head in his hands and fought back the tears threatening to form. He didn’t look up, didn’t look at anyone else because he could already feel them staring at him anyway.

The host of the test spoke again. “Well, that’s the end of question 1, there’s two more to go. 17 points, so you’re still on track to win- dammit, I told Kragus this test was too lenient, your performance is abysmal and still-”

“Can we continue, please?” Allura tried to sound diplomatic but couldn’t fight the annoyance creeping into her voice.

“Okay, okay, geez. Question 2: What team member do you feel you closest to?”

Allura was up first again. Everyone guessed Shiro.

It was revealed she answered Pidge.

“What? We hang out a lot and chat with the mice. Sorry Shiro, Pidge wins.”

“I guess that’s fair.” Shiro smiled.

Shiro was next. Keith, Hunk, and Lance guessed Allura. Allura and Pidge picked Keith.

Shiro’s answer was Keith, and everyone shifted nervously as they realized two rounds of this question only earned them two measley points.

But up next was Lance, and for once he was easy to predict. Everyone had the correct answer of Hunk.

“Whew, finally!” Lance yelled. “Did I mention how much I love being predictable?”

Keith followed. Pidge looked smug with their answer of Lance, and the rest guessed Shiro.

Keith’s actual answer was Shiro. He gave a short glare at Pidge, who looked casually at their hands and said “Give it a little time.” Hunk tried not to laugh and Lance only looked confused.

The guesses for Pidge were more scattered than the others. Keith guessed Lance, Shiro guessed Allura, Allura guessed Shiro, and Hunk and Lance had the correct guess of Hunk.

“What can I say, I love you all but Hunk makes really good snacks.”

“Understandable.” Lance nodded in agreement.

For a moment it seemed like the first question hadn’t happened, the energy of the room was more comfortable.

Then the guesses for Hunk’s answer came up. Pretty much everyone guessed Lance, except one answer of Pidge.

“Lance,” Hunk said in a voice that was barely controlled. “How many times have I told you you’re my best friend? You know, yeah, we’re a trio, you, Pidge, and me, but we’ve known each other a lot longer and you know this! Are you purposely getting things wrong at this point or-”

“Hunk, stop it.” Pidge said.

“He’s going to get himself killed! We’re two questions in with 34 points and the last question is open-ended. He has just about two that he guessed right, and we need 16 points on an open-ended question or my best friend dies because he thinks I-”

“Maybe it’s not about you.” Keith muttered. Despite how quiet he was, Hunk stopped and looked directly at him.

“I’m not trying to be the victim here, Keith, I just can’t believe-” His voice cracked. “I’ve known him so long and I never noticed- this. It’s kind of my job to noti-”

“Can you guys just stop talking about me like I’m not here?” Lance sounded like he wished he were anywhere else. “I get it, I fucked up, I’m ruining yet another mission because I’m an idiot. I probably ruined the next question too, but can we please just- stop.” His voice was almost a whisper on the last word.

The host’s voice came back. “Are you guys done with your soap opera over there? We’re moving on.”


	3. Chapter 3

“Final question, as you guys mentioned in your bickering it was not multiple choice. If your answer is not quite the same but essentially means the same thing, you will still be awarded a point. Now, without further ado: What could you work on on your part to improve the overall performance of the team?”

Allura was first again. All five scribbled responses about having more confidence or trusting herself more. When her answer was revealed to be just that, the team whooped.

“Aw, yeah, baby, you’re the best, Allura!” Lance cheered. “No multiple choice, no problem!”

Allura blushed, not altogether unembarrassed that her top issue was so obvious, but glad nevertheless that they were earning points.

Shiro was next. Hunk, Allura, and Pidge all guessed along the lines of needing to trust his team more, Keith guessed he needed to stop overthinking things, and Lance guessed he should “actually get some sleep.” Shiro got a chuckle out of that one.

“Lance, that’s Pidge with that problem.”

“Oh please, you too. Don’t think I don’t see you wandering the halls at 3 am. And let’s not let Keith off the hook either.”

“Hey Lance, if you always see us all up at 3 am, are you not also up at 3 am?” Pidge asked, smirking.

“Well, yeah, but- ugh that’s different! Anyways they put up the answer, you guys were right, Shiro thinks he should trust other people more. What are we up to?”

“You have a total of 42 points.” The announcer stated.

“Wow, see, that’s not bad, we just need like 8 more. Cool.” Lance leaned back. “See guys, we got this.”

Lance was next. Keith, Shiro, and Allura said things along the lines of him needing to take things more seriously or that he needed to focus more. Hunk and Pidge said he should train more.

Lance had an odd look on his face, so Hunk spoke. “Just so you know, I’m not saying you need more training, this was just guessing at what you would say.”

Lance didn’t respond.

“Lance, you didn’t say something stupid, did you?” Pidge prodded.

Lance’s answer was revealed on the screen. It said only one word: “Leave.”

Silence fell over the team. For a few moments at least.

“This isn’t funny.” Keith said, not really believing this could be Lance thinking this way.

Lance was a little annoyed when he answered. “Oh yeah, Keith, I decided to lie on this trust test because I wanted a good laugh, what a great prank I thought of.”

“I assure you the test would have detected any lying and you would have been facing serious consequences right now if any of you lied on a single question. It’s clean.” The announcer supplied. “Moving on, let’s see what you put for Keith.”

All the paladins looked like they wanted to say something to Lance, but they knew it wasn’t the right time. When they got back to the castle. That’s when they’d have a serious discussion.

Luckily, Keith managed to be an easier guess. Four answers read “Improve Communication” or “Get better at talking to people,” while Shiro’s read “Stop jumping into risky situations”.

Keith’s was, in the end, “Learn to communicate better.” The team was a little relieved, now only four points from victory with two teammates to go.

The guesses for Pidge’s answer ranged from things like “Go to bed” from Lance, to “Stay on task” from Keith and Allura, to “Stop dealing with problems solo” from Shiro and Hunk.

It turned out to be “Stay on task.”

Then the guesses for Hunk came up.

Keith, Shiro, and Allura guessed he wanted to stop underestimating himself. Lance said he should demand more respect, and Pidge said he needed to give away trust less freely.

His answer didn’t need to come up on the screen. He was already yelling.

“No. No! This is ridiculous, it’s- what does one point get us, we can’t be- we can’t be one point away, it’s not fair.”

The board revealed that he said he was overly trusting and should learn to turn it down.

Lance looked at his feet and swallowed.

The announcer’s voice was loud and unwelcome to the ears of the paladins. “Well, folks, it looks like you ended with 49 points, so close, but you didn’t quite make it!”


	4. Chapter 4

“I gotta say, though, what an interesting game. Too bad it had to end like this, you know, I really do hate to kill a paladin of Voltron, but rules are r-”

“No.” Allura said, her voice sounding so final that the host stopped speaking. “What kind of people are you? You tell us you value trust, but then don’t reveal what we are risking until you have us trapped. Maybe you should take a look at your own actions and realize we are not the untrustworthy ones here!”

“Well, well, well, we have-” The host started.

“I’m not finished.” Allura continued. “You will let us leave here with Lance, or else we will see to it you never find another people willing to work with you. You may not want us as an ally, but we will make your life miserable if you make us an enemy.” Allura glared up at the wall she knew the host was hiding behind.

“Wow.” Lance raised his eyebrows. “And I thought I’d seen Allura get mad at me.”

“How about a choice?” The host suggested. “You can still walk out of here with an alliance– access to our resources, information, and troops willing to follow you wherever you go. We will be your best advantage when you go to fight Zarkon again. Or you can walk out with Lance.”

“That’s easy. We pick Lance.” Allura said, most of the other paladins nodding.

“Now hold up here-” Everyone’s breath seemed to catch as Lance started talking.

“There’s no argument to make here, Lance.” Allura trained her eyes on him. “You’re a thousand times more important to the team than them.”

“Errrr- but-” Lance seemed to be fighting with himself over whether he should keep his mouth shut.

“There’s no ‘but’s, Allura’s right.” Shiro said.

“Yeah, do you actually think we’d ever just let you die for diplomacy points?” Pidge asked.

“Look, hear me out: you can still form Voltron without me, just move Allura back to Blue, which she pilots better than me, by the way, and you’ll be– better off, I guess. These guys, I listened in the briefing, they have a strong immunity to most magic Haggar can do. Do you know how important that is?”

“Lance-” Hunk’s face looked pained.

The host picked then to speak up. “He has a point, you know. He’s the weakest link you have, even if he’s the only one to acknowledge it. On guessing correctly, the rest of you average in at around 9 points per person. He has a total of 4. If he wasn’t on your team in this game, you would have racked up 40 points, and adjusting for one less member, you would have only needed 34.”

“We don’t care!” Keith yelled. “You can’t just kill him. I don’t think we could even function properly without him!”

“Really?” Lance asked.

Keith’s answer was drowned out by the host. “Very well. You passed the test.”

“What?” The team asked in unison.

The host chuckled. “The point of this test was to see if you let fighting break you apart when your teammate’s answers were not what you would expect. That increases the tension, and then in the end you are tested to determine whether or not you would betray your teammate in exchange for all we have to offer you. If you do, you are of no use to us, as we could lose your allyship to the next-highest bidder. You chose not to betray him, so you passed the test. Thank you for playing. We will contact you with further details.”

The room’s lighting changed back to normal and the paladins were released from their chairs.

“Oh.” Was all Lance could say.

Hunk practically tackled him in a hug. “Lance, we did it! You’re still alive, and now we’re going to go back to the castle and I can make you the best cookies you’ve ever had, and we can play some video games, and-”

“But first,” Shiro interrupted. “We’re going to all have a talk. As a team.”

***************************************************************************

Back in the castle, Lance was cursing himself as he waited for the awkward talk where everyone told him he mattered, or whatever. He tried putting it off, walking really slow out of his lion and making sure he was the last one to get to the room where they all gathered.

“Lance, you’re here!” Pidge said the second Lance appeared in the doorway.

“Yeah, yeah, let’s get this over with.”

Shiro stood up. “Lance, you’re not a weak link. We all stand together, and we all have our strengths. You need to know that no one sees you as worse-”

“And how come Keith isn’t getting this lecture too? He thought both Allura and I would pick him as the weakest link.”

Keith stood up. “I didn’t pick myself! And you kept saying it for every single answer! I’ll admit it, I doubt myself sometimes, I doubt how you all see me sometimes, but that’s not exactly a secret! There’s six other people you could have gone to, how come not even one of us knew you were feeling this way? It just- it doesn’t add up!”

Lance’s voice came out barely audible. “Sounds like you should leave the math to Pidge.” He regretted the words as soon as he said them, because he watched Keith’s face collapse, going from looking concerned to utterly destroyed.

Keith took a step back, putting his face into his hands as he sighed. Now wasn’t the time for this, for feeling bad and giving yourself grief for saying the wrong thing months ago.

Lance cleared his throat. “Come on, Keith, I didn’t mean anything by that, it was a joke, it wasn’t-”

“No, don’t apologize. That was- I just can’t believe I didn’t see it. You came to me, you told me you felt like an extra member of the team we’d end up getting rid of, and I- I basically just brushed you off, but I shouldn’t have, alright? I won’t do it again.”

The other paladins looked confused, but decided that was a conversation for another time.

Allura put a hand on Lance’s shoulder. “Lance, feel free to talk to any one of us about how you feel. I personally recommend Coran, in my experience he’s the best at listening to someone’s problems. We’ll also have more bonding exercises to make sure this doesn’t happen again. We’ll be closer as a team, and you will be able to see how important you are to us.”

Pidge pushed up their glasses. “And you don’t need to pretend to be someone you’re not. I know how exhausting it is to keep up a happy face when I’m sad on the inside. You shouldn’t feel you have to do that.”

Lance mumbled, scratching the back of his neck. “You all have worse things to worry about, I don’t want to bother-”

“Nope! You’re not going to bother anyone!” Hunk said.

“And if you think about it, you try to act happy all the time because helping us be happy is what makes you feel better about yourself when you feel bad, right?” Pidge got a nod from Lance. “Right, so if you let us help you once in a while, you’ll actually be helping us feel better about ourselves. It’s a win-win.”

Lance stood there, pursing his lips. “…Maybe.”

“Okay,” Shiro said, moving forward. “Now I need a few words with just Lance.”

Lance cringed as his friends left the room.

“Now, Lance, I need you to be honest with me.” Shiro sat down and gestured for Lance to follow. “Today, when there was an option between you dying or us not gaining an ally, you were arguing for the latter.”

Lance swallowed and started to lie. “I wasn’t really thinking about-”

“You said the team would be better off without you.” There was a beat of silence. “You don’t want to die, do you?”

“I mean-” Lance shrugged. “If it helps the team, I’ll do anything. If it was a situation where it would either be me or one of you, I’d choose-”

“But that wasn’t the situation today.”

“No, but-” Lance ran a hand through his hair. “But wasn’t it? In a way? If we didn’t have those guys, we’d have a lot more trouble facing Haggar. I know she’s probably gonna be harder to fight than Zarkon himself, and I couldn’t- I didn’t want you to go in without all the protection you can get.”

Shiro nodded apprehensively. “Back on Earth, did you take any medication? Get any diagnosis?”

“I- um- no. I’m fine. I don’t have any problems with-” He looked at Shiro and then started over. “I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it, and then my parents would have had to pay for medications and appointments, and I just- they shouldn’t have to do that, so I just didn’t tell anyone.”

“But you think you have depression?”

“At the least.” Lance said.

“Well, we’re going to help you figure that out. I spoke to Coran briefly and he is working on calibrating some Altean scanners used to monitor the levels of neurotransmitters in the brain and change them if they aren’t where they should be. When he’s done, it’ll work on humans, too. And we should probably all give it a go, you don’t have to be the only one. How’s that sound?”

Lance smiled a little. “Good.”

“That’s good. Now, I think Hunk said something about making you cookies?”

“Right!” Lance hopped up out of his seat. “I should go check on his progress! And uh- thanks Shiro.” He said before leaving.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Now that this is over, feel free to give me Voltron prompts!! You can send them to my tumblr at whatteam-voltron!!!


End file.
